Climate breakdown is already changing the taste and quality of beer, scientists have warned.
The quantity and quality of hops, a key ingredient in most beers, is being affected by global heating, according to a study. As a result, beer may become more expensive and manufacturers will have to adapt their brewing methods.
Researchers forecast that hop yields in European growing regions will fall by 4-18 percent by 2050 if farmers do not adapt to hotter and drier weather, while the content of alpha acids in the hops, which gives beers their distinctive taste and smell, will fall by 20-31 percent.
Photo: Bloomberg
“Beer drinkers will definitely see the climate change, either in the price tag or the quality,” said Miroslav Trnka, a scientist at the Global Change Research Institute of the Czech Academy of Sciences and co-author of the study, published in the journal Nature Communications. “That seems to be inevitable from our data.”
Beer, the third-most popular drink in the world after water and tea, is made by fermenting malted grains like barley with yeast. It is usually flavored with aromatic hops grown mostly in the middle latitudes that are sensitive to changes in light, heat and water.
In recent years, demand for high-quality hops has been pushed up by a boom in craft beers with stronger flavors. But emissions of planet-heating gases are putting the plant at risk, the study found.
Photo: Reuters
The researchers compared the average annual yield of aroma hops during the periods 1971-1994 and 1995-2018 and found “a significant production decrease” of 0.13-0.27 tons per hectare. Celje, in Slovenia, had the greatest fall in average annual hop yield, at 19.4 percent.
In Germany, the second-biggest hop producer in the world, average hop yields have fallen 19.1 percent in Spalt, 13.7 percent in Hallertau, and 9.5 percent in Tettnang, the study found.
Beer-brewing in central Europe dates back thousands of years and is a cornerstone of the culture. People in the Czech Republic drink more beer than anywhere else in the world, according to a report from the Japanese beermaker Kirin. In Germany, where beer-making has been regulated for 500 years by a “purity law,” the Oktoberfest welcomes 6 million beer-drinkers from across the world into its tents each year.
Photo: AFP
The taste of beer does not just depend on the hops, but it explains part of the drink’s popularity, said Trnka.
“Across the pubs of Europe, the most frequent debate except weather and politics is about the … beer.”
But weather and politics are both changing the taste of beers. World leaders have promised to try to stop the planet heating by more than 1.5 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels by the end of the century, but are pumping out too much greenhouse gas to meet that target.
Photo: Reuters
The study found the alpha acid content of hops, which give beer its distinct aroma, had fallen in all regions.
As temperatures rise and rainfall dwindles, some hop farmers have moved gardens higher, put them in valleys with more water and changed the spacing of crop rows.
Andreas Auernhammer, a hop farmer in Spalt in southern Germany, said the total rainfall in his fields had changed little but that now “the rain does not come at the right time.”
He has built an irrigation system to feed the hops at critical periods. “We would have big problems if we couldn’t water them.”
The researchers modelled the effect of future warming on crops using an emissions scenario similar to current policies. By 2050, they found, hop yields will fall 4.1-18.4 percent compared with the average from 1989-2018 if no measures are taken to adapt. The projected decline will be driven mainly by hotter weather and more frequent and severe droughts.
Trnka said: “Growers of hops will have to go the extra mile to make sure they will get the same quality as today, which probably will mean a need for greater investment just to keep the current level of the product.”
Auernhammer said the climate threat to hops was important but added it was not the biggest factor in the price of a beer. High energy costs, driven by the soaring price of fossil gas since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, have played a bigger role for brewers.
“The hops inside a beer do not cost as much as the cap on top of the bottle,” he said.
The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), and the country’s other political groups dare not offend religious groups, says Chen Lih-ming (陳立民), founder of the Taiwan Anti-Religion Alliance (台灣反宗教者聯盟). “It’s the same in other democracies, of course, but because political struggles in Taiwan are extraordinarily fierce, you’ll see candidates visiting several temples each day ahead of elections. That adds impetus to religion here,” says the retired college lecturer. In Japan’s most recent election, the Liberal Democratic Party lost many votes because of its ties to the Unification Church (“the Moonies”). Chen contrasts the progress made by anti-religion movements in
Taiwan doesn’t have a lot of railways, but its network has plenty of history. The government-owned entity that last year became the Taiwan Railway Corp (TRC) has been operating trains since 1891. During the 1895-1945 period of Japanese rule, the colonial government made huge investments in rail infrastructure. The northern port city of Keelung was connected to Kaohsiung in the south. New lines appeared in Pingtung, Yilan and the Hualien-Taitung region. Railway enthusiasts exploring Taiwan will find plenty to amuse themselves. Taipei will soon gain its second rail-themed museum. Elsewhere there’s a number of endearing branch lines and rolling-stock collections, some
Could Taiwan’s democracy be at risk? There is a lot of apocalyptic commentary right now suggesting that this is the case, but it is always a conspiracy by the other guys — our side is firmly on the side of protecting democracy and always has been, unlike them! The situation is nowhere near that bleak — yet. The concern is that the power struggle between the opposition Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and their now effectively pan-blue allies the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) and the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) intensifies to the point where democratic functions start to break down. Both
This was not supposed to be an election year. The local media is billing it as the “2025 great recall era” (2025大罷免時代) or the “2025 great recall wave” (2025大罷免潮), with many now just shortening it to “great recall.” As of this writing the number of campaigns that have submitted the requisite one percent of eligible voters signatures in legislative districts is 51 — 35 targeting Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus lawmakers and 16 targeting Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmakers. The pan-green side has more as they started earlier. Many recall campaigns are billing themselves as “Winter Bluebirds” after the “Bluebird Action”
RSS